A.

Plan of Investigation To what extent did the crisis of the ancient regimes role of monarchy with Louis XVI intellectual, political, social, financial, and economic challenges necessitate the rise of Napoleon?

The investigation assesses the intellectual, political, social, financial, and economic challenges with the crisis of the ancient regimes role of monarchy with Louis XVI that necessitated Napoleons rise to power. In order to evaluate the role of the ancient regime in monarchy with Louis XVI and the challenges complementary to it, the investigation evaluates the influence of the Estates of the ancient regime; the influence of the ancient regime is investigated through the sway of power that was held with King Louis XVI within the First and Second Estates, the voting of the Estates in the Estates-General, and the ideas of the Enlightenment. Two of the sources used within the essay are History of the French Revolution from 1789 to 1814 compiled by M. Mignet, and The French Revolution compiled by Thomas Carlyle are then evaluated for their origins, purposes, values, and limitations.

What the investigation does not take into account, however, is that Louis XVI , who was at the age of 20, was too young, inexperienced, and politically weak to bring about the reforms that were desperately needed by France at the time.

B. Summary of Evidence

The ancient regime was a social system that consisted of three social classes, or Estates. These were the First, Second, and Third estate. The First and Second, being made up of Nobility and Church officials that were extremely wealthy, had more of a pull with the King politically, socially, and financially. These estates, called the privileged estates, were exempt from taxes and even the law (though the First Estate, which was made up of Church officials, werent exempt from the religious law or duties). The Third estate consisted off the main tax payers, which were not exempt from any taxes and payment fell heavily upon the individuals; for all the burdens laid upon them since that day when liberty was enchained and France became the bond-slave of her monarchs. Louis XVI paid for the selfish glory of Louis XVI; the nobles paid for the pleasures which their forefathers had so carelessly enjoyed; the privileged classes for the privileges which they had usurped and had so grievously misused. Many who wished well to France, many who had labored for her salvation, perished; virtue received the just punishment of vice.1 At this time the government system was in control of the monarchs, who ruled by divine right. This meant that they believed God put the world in motion, God put some people in positions of power, power was given by God, that no man can question God, no one could question someone put in power by God, and questioning the monarchy was blasphemy because it meant questioning God. In addition with this government, the King had rights and privileges that were given to certain individual that were, for the most part, nobility. For example the King could appoint the Intendants, the petty tyrants who governed Frances 30 districts, appoint the people who would collect his taxes and carry out his laws, and control justice by appointing judges. Other things he could do were make laws, make war and peace decisions, but most importantly he could imprison anyone at anytime for any reason, if there was one (blank warrants of arrest were called letters de cachet) and he levied the taxes and decided
1

History of the French Revolution from 1789 to 1814 compiled by M. Mignet, pgs 1 and 2

just how much each estate would pay in their taxes while also deciding how to spend the money. The economic conditions under the ancient regime were a reflection of the Kings decisions regarding his power. For example, the economy of France was based primarily upon agriculture, and while most the peasant farmers crops were being sold, they were the most heavily taxed, thus, the little amount of profit they received was being used mainly for taxes. Not only did the peasants have trouble paying their taxes regularly, but when there was a poor harvest, they had all the more difficulty paying the taxes that had to be paid. The peasants could not afford even the slightest raise in taxes. The bourgeoisies still managed to gather wealth, but , just as the peasant farmers were, were angry with the fact that they were the only people paying taxes, seeing that the nobility of the second estate and the clergy of the first estate were exempt from these heavy taxations. At this time, France was also in an economic depression. Louis XVI was managing the money from the tax payers on lavishing himself and residences such as Versailles. His wife, Marie Antoinette was also seen as an extravagant spender. They were deficit spending, because France had depleted its funds by funding wars, such as the American Revolution. This in addition to frivolous spending on the King and Queens part ended in the solution of relying on the tax payers money to help fill the deficit, but seeming there was only one estate paying the taxes, the taxes continuously rose to amounts that were extremely difficult for the low- income citizens to afford. The nobility of the First Estate and the clergy of the Second Estate refused to be taxed, thus putting more financial pressure upon the Third Estate, whom were already paying ludicrously high taxes. The ideas of the Renaissance played a large part in that they made the people of France question the rights of the King and Royalty. This was due to the secular ideas and the philosophes, who

used reason and logic rather than religion and faith. They used this way of thinking to determine human institutions such as governments and how they were made. This brought a great deal of change within the Third Estate and through other parts within France. The bases of the revolution had been set with the different long term and short term causes of the revolution. For example the Great Fear, which was the greatest famine in history, took place and the attacks on the nobility during the year of 1789. Another one of these causes was the bankruptcy of France, which had forced Louis XVI to call a meeting of the Estates-General. Estates could not agree, they each created a cahier, or a list of complaints and grievances to be heard out by the king. The Estates met and, since the first time since 1614, discussed the cahiers and the bankruptcy that had taken hold of France. Though the meeting was for all ideas to be shared, the king did not allow vote by population, but instead by Estate. When the three estates met for the Estates-General, the Third, made up of mostly peasants and the severely poor and the largest estate, would become deadlocked, or out voted, on the issues of taxes by the First and Second estates , and so the situation for tax payment would stay the same. Because the third estate, weary of the continually rising taxes and lack of support, began to declare themselves the National Assembly on June 17, 1789 after no agreements could be made on the reformations that should be made. They invited the members of the other two estates to join them in one assembly. The members all took an oath to stay together until a new constitution was adopted. Louis XVI ordered against this by locking the Third Estate out of the meeting house, but his order was ignored and they swiftly relocated to an abandoned tennis court where the tennis court oath was made, thus, Louis XVI was forced to reverse his position. The King finally ordered that the Estates would vote through population for

a new constitution. Through this meeting, the Estates set in motion a series of events which resulted in the abolition of the monarchy and a completely new socio-political system for France. One event that was caused by this meeting was the storming of Bastille. This was because Louis XVI did not want a new constitution , but in reality he wanted to use military force against the National Assembly. When the people caught word of this, they revolted by destroying part of Bastilles and burning building that held their financial burdens to the ground. Then, after the peasants received weapons from Bastille, the people began to attack nobility and royalty, thus causing them to flee. The people eventually set up their own form of government, which was still full of complications, thus setting the grounds for Napoleon to essentially return France to a new and improved state. C. Evaluation of sources Midget, M.: History of the French Revolution From 1789 to 1814 This book was a good resource for the fact that its origin was from a primary view of a citizen of France during the time at which the revolution was taking place. This resource is a book that wash produced by the Project Gutenberg co. and further more has interesting detail of the accounts at which they were seen through the eyes of a citizen. The purpose of the book is to communicate the event that had happened during the revolution in the way the author interprets the event and how he feels about the events that happened. However, the value of the book is great because it gives insight from a nobles point of view. The limitations of the literature, however, are that despite the great insight there is some bias upon the authors part; for example, some bias as to how he regards the King and the nobles along with the peasants of the time is evident within the text. Carlyle, Thomas: A History of the French Revolution

This book was a very valuable asset to the research in that it was also written by a primary witness to the event in France through the eyes of a citizen as the revolution took place. The origin of this book was within France at the very beginning of the revolution. This resource is a book that wash produced by the Project Gutenberg co. and further more has interesting detail of the accounts at which they were seen through the eyes of a citizen. The purpose of this selection was, as the first, to give insight upon the events of the French Revolution and the events that triggered such an event from a different perspective. The value of the source is that it is seen through the eyes of a middle class citizen who had been in the Third Estate with the peasants and had to pay taxes. The limitations of the source, however, are in the fact that the source may be slightly biased in his feeling of the king, the clergy, and the noble, which seeing them as frivolous, greedy men.